America 2.0

Supreme Court broadens police searches. Of course it does.

The Supreme Court offered unanimous support for police Wednesday by allowing drug evidence gathered after an arrest that violated state law to be used at trial, an important search-and-seizure case turning on the constitutional limits of "probable cause."

…David Lee Moore was stopped by Portsmouth, Virginia, officers five years ago for driving his vehicle on a suspended license. Under state law in such incidents, only a summons is to be issued and the motorist is to be allowed to go. Instead, detectives detained Moore for almost an hour, arrested him, then searched him and found cocaine.

At trial, Moore's lawyers tried to suppress the evidence, but the state judge allowed it, even though the court noted the arrest violated state law. A police detective, asked why the man was arrested, replied, "Just our prerogative."

While some of the justices expressed concern about that level of discretion at oral arguments in January, their 9-0 ruling raised few such doubts.

Fare thee well, America 1.0. It was nice knowing ye.

More America 2.0 here.

[Fair Warning: Anyone who uses this post as a soapbox to lecture people about how they must vote for the Democratic nominee for precisely this reason will be smacked with a dead fish. I'm just not in the goddamned mood. And frankly, I don't think most Shakers are, either, so can it.]